Nitish rules out possibility of JD (U), Congress alliance

Patna: Amid speculations about chance of Congress going with Janata Dal (United) instead of Lalu Prasad Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday categorically ruled out this possibility and said that even a last minute decision on special category status to the state could not pave way for such a tie-up.

"It is a baseless speculation, there is no truth in this," Nitish told reporters.

"Sawal paida nahin hota hain (the question does not arise)," he said on chance of JD (U) and Congress forging alliance for the coming elections.

"There has been no such proposal from the beginning, it is an unnecessary speculation," he said.

Nitish alleged the Congress and RJD are natural allies.

"Whether talks on alliance between them is progressing or not is their concern, we have nothing to do with it," he said after emerging from a programme to lay foundation of road projects in Patna.

Nitish, who is the driving force of JD (U), said that his party would have electoral tie up with CPI and CPM in Bihar for the general elections.

"While an understanding on seats have been reached with CPI, the same is in process with CPM," he said.

The Chief Minister, however, did not disclose the seats and said that it would be made public soon.

On Modi's comments on Third Front, Nitish said "Takleef usi ko lekar hai (pain is because of this)."

Commenting on BJP’s efforts to play the backward and extremely backward caste cards by highlighting Modi's humble background, he said, "While Bihar has annexure one and two to categorize backward castes for providing benefits, is there anything like that in Gujarat?"

He said that people like Jayprakash Narayan, Chaudhary Charan Singh and VP Singh were not born in backward castes but championed their cause.

Stating that secularism is the essence of the country's tradition, the Bihar Chief Minister said, "Respect for all religions cannot be done only by uttering good words but there is a need to sincerely work for welfare of all communities."

On his Gujarat counterpart's development claims, he said, "Developing Bihar, which is a landlocked state, is far more difficult than a state located on coast.”

"Everybody knows the truth of his development through statistics and existence of a large number of people below the poverty line and suffering from malnutrition," he said.